The Piano Sonata No.5, Op. 53, is written by Alexander Scriabin in 1907. This was his first sonata to be written in one movement, a format he retained from then on. A typical performance lasts from 11 to 12 minutes.

“The Fifth Sonata, one of the most frequently played of the composer’s works, owes a great deal to the orchestral Poem of Ecstasy, and for this reason the Sonata is occasionally given that same title. Both draw on a poem by written by Scriabin, of which four lines are affixed to the beginning of the Sonata (a passage which “calls to life” the artist’s “hidden longings,” an example of the composer’s ever-increasing obsession with his own creative powers)…” [source]

Hans Rott (1 August 1858–25 June 1884) was an Austrian composer and organist. His music is little-known today, though he received high praise in his time from the likes of Gustav Mahler and Anton Bruckner. Rott’s mind snapped in October 1880, whilst on a train journey. He was reported to have threatened another passenger with a revolver, claiming that Brahms had filled the train with dynamite. Rott was committed to a mental hospital in 1881, where despite a brief recovery, he sank into depression. By the end of 1883 a diagnosis recorded ‘hallucinatory insanity, persecution mania—recovery no longer to be expected.’ He died of tuberculosis in 1884, aged only 25. Many well-wishers, including Bruckner, attended Rott’s funeral at the Zentralfriedhof in Vienna.